[ 2020 Schedule ]

Special Exhibitions

March 14–July 26, 2020 *Extended

Ryuzaburo Shikiba: Mirrors of Cerebral Ventricles

While employed as a physician and managing a hospital, the psychiatrist Ryuzaburo Shikiba (1898-1965) studied and popularized the work of a number of artists in Japan, including that of Vincent van Gogh. Shikiba exerted a tremendous influence on the culture through an extremely enlightened and diverse range of activities. These included his involvement in Muneyoshi Yanagi’s research on the sculptor Mokujiki and the Mingei movement; his introduction of Nishoutei, a strange building that once stood in the Fukagawa district of Tokyo; and his pioneering advocacy of outsider art. In this exhibition, we took an all-encompassing look at Shikiba’s endeavors by examining artworks from his collection other documents.

The Innocent Paintings: Ai-Mitsu, Shunsuke, and the Painters of the War Era

Ai-Mitsu (1907-1946) created distinctive paintings, which combine fantastic expressions with detailed and highly realistic depictions while displaying the influence of classical Asian art. Focusing on Tokyo, which at the time was in the midst of becoming a metropolis, for his subject matter, Matsumoto Shunsuke (1912-1948) devised a unique world containing a mixture of images. In addition to important works by these artists, the exhibition presents some 165 outstanding pieces from the late 1920s to the early ’50s. The event provides a new generation with an opportunity to reconsider the power of painting as Hiroshima commemorates the 76th anniversary of the atomic bomb.

Alfredo Jaar, Music (Everything I know I learned the day my son was born), 2013

July 18–October 18, 2020 *Postponed

The 11th Hiroshima Art Prize Alfredo Jaar

The Hiroshima Art Prize was created to convey the “Spirit of Hiroshima” to the world by means of contemporary art. Alfredo Jaar (b. 1956), the 12th recipient of the award adopts a journalistic approach in which he thorough examines and researches historical events and tragedies, and social inequalities all around the world. By presenting his work in public places, and making installations, consisting of photographs, videos, and architectural spaces, which appeal to all five senses, Jaar strives to convey information about various social, political, and humanitarian problems. This exhibition, the artist’s first full-fledged solo show ever held in Japan, includes important works from the past as well as new pieces made especially for Hiroshima.

Open Programs

Hana Sawada, Gesture of Rally #1705, 2017

August 1 - October 18, 2020

Summer Open Lab Sawada Hana: A 360-degree Detour

Sawada Hana (b. 1991) focuses on small unidentified objects in photographs and other printed matter. Using a variety of methods to analyze and examine these things, Sawada makes installations that showcase this process. Although the obscure and indistinct tend to make us anxious, Sawada neither ignores nor eliminates anything for this reason. Sawada accepts a given entity as it is, and allows her imagination to run free, and when there is no answer, she questions the meaning of continuing to consider it. The exhibition will provide viewers an opportunity to enjoy a variety of scenes as they make a series of detours – none of which are wrong.

Open Call for Art Project Ideas and Design Ideas of “Hiroshima Brand” 2020

Open Call for Art Project Ideas, which accepts submissions from the public for work plans, and Hiroshima Brand competition, which accepts submissions for design plans related to Hiroshima, are held simultaneously in a free public space. Winning-entries will be shown in the former Hiroshima branch of the Bank of Japan, a building that survived the atomic bombing of the city.

Note: Please see the official competition website or an event flier for more details in August.

Video Art Programs

May 8–July 26, 2020

[The 69th Program] Ahn Sungseok

This work is a simulation of a first-person video game. Ahn describes a game as “a virtual space where all eras of history blend together,” and says that “playing a game is a process of creating a new or fictional history.” In the actual game that Ahn utilized to produce this work, the player can freely alter everything including the game’s content.

The artist floats in a pool sheathed in an elaborately constructed violin, while manipulating its strings to produce sounds. A “maiden voyage” is the first voyage of a new vessel and also the title of this work, a performance Rosa Nussbaum presented as her graduation project and the video documenting it.

This year, the 75th anniversary of the end of World War II, we consider the power of painting by looking back at the work of artists who lived through the war in a two-part exhibition. The first part consists of approximately 50 works by the Hiroshima-born painter Ai-Mitsu (1907-1946) as well as pieces by other artists of the era. The second part examines an exhibition of The Hiroshima Panels, a collaborative work made by Maruki Iri (1901-1995) and his wife Toshi (1912-2000), which was held in 1952 at the Morimasa Department Store in Kiryu, Gunma Prefecture.